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I do hate generalizations, especially ones based on Hollywood caricatures. Most Americans are and have always been well mannered. People I know usually demur from expressing their displeasure, preferring instead to remain silent and take their business elsewhere in the future. The only people I have ever heard express themselves in this crude way were Hollywood actors like Cagney. Give us a break! Your ex-colonies are really quite civilized.

Now back to Bach...

Bach is emotional in a way that is (in my mind and understanding, anyway) very in keeping with the prevailing norms of his day. The emotion in Bach's music is covered and subdued (although there are certainly instances when it is more apparent). It is much more difficult to understand and access this emotion than it is to understand that huge, crashing chords in Rachmaninoff signify anger. However, this does not mean that Bach's music is any less worthy of respect as Music, not as technical exercises - the WTC is much more than just a technique builder. It requires work to understand what Bach is trying to convey, but the reward is a rich one, indeed.

Au contraire, Cagney's screen persona was at complete odds with his private life... which was always very private. He was a very devoted and loving husband who avoided the tabloid scandals of some of his fellow actors.

As far as Americans being well mannered, well as you wish. London has always been inundated with Americans, they think somehow that because they arrived on United or American airlines, they have come to some exotic location. But more often than not, they're totally clueless about history or tradition. Westminster Abbey -hey, we've racked another one up!, must be some low-church American religion for want of knowing better- is just another bloody structure to visit, and sorry for them that pictures are not allowed. Doesn't help their flickr accounts...

Alas, Salisbury is just a day trip via rail from London Victoria... so the Americans go there too, and they 'bagged' another one. Plenty of photo opportunities, the flickr accounts burst with activity.

But nothing will ever match some Americans I met at Ely. I was so embarrassed. Generalizations? Perhaps, but their 'batting' average ain't very good.

Jason, I'm sure when Deborah cited Cagney she meant behavior typical of one of his tough-guy characters on screen (though there are some actors—and people in other high-status professions, too—who do feel sufficiently empowered and entitled to engage in boorishness).

But why indulge in stereotypes at all, especially ones that concern national origin or ethnicity? If we're expected to laugh off the phenomenon of the "Ugly American," then what about the generalizations about other peoples that are significantly more noxious? In a global forum where every participant is an individual—and where feathers are easily ruffled even on a good day—it seems pointless to go down that road at all.

Steven

Sorry, Steven. I got a bit out of line, especially when 'pints' are involved. Emotions with me run very, very high as you so well know.

I was waiting for Deborah to come back at me for American ignorance, hardly the case, my mum is American, and... guess what?... I spent five years of my boyhood in the US Pacific Northwest. Hmmm, could it be Seattle? That's where Deborah is from. We went to church every Sunday at St. Mark's Cathedral. Very 'Episcopal', hardly Anglican. Gorgeous building, though.

Extremely interesting idea IMHO. For me at least, the "sublime" but "lack of emotion" made me think of Ravel and much of Debussy although I know from an earlier discussion about this many PW members don't feel that way about their music.

I think I could listen to Ondine a few times a week for the rest of my life and not get tired of it. But I don't find it emotional, just sublimely beautiful. Same for J'eux deux and many other Ravel pieces.

Could you give us some examples of pieces that you feel fall into the specific non emotional categories you mentioned?

Much of Medtner's music falls into the same category, IMHO.

Funny thing. Debussy and Ravel utterly amaze me with their technique and ingeniousness. Really terrific stuff. And yet, with the overwhelming exception of Ravel's two piano concertos, my life would not be significantly different or poorer without them. I truly hate Ravel's assault on Mussorgsky's Pictures, but that is a hopelessly hard sell. I must be one of the few on this planet who feels that way.

But could any two composers be more different? Mussorgsky, the unrefined, utterly stark genius of the Russians... Ravel, the French dandy and his foppy outfits and pretensions of... well, whatever.

Ravel had a marvelous gift of orchestration (no other orchestrations of Pictures come close- I've heard several others), but one really wonders if the punishment fits the crime.

Good grief, a whole 'nother bag... whew! let us be careful.

btb - Bach was not only a master of spiritual music, but a master of music of Baroque dance forms as well. I wonder if perhaps you are approaching the Bb fugue in the wrong way. If you think of it (and play it) as a lively dance it absolutely SPARKLES. I find the Prelude to be exhilarating - a tour de force etude.

Do I detect a fellow fan of Medtner?

Or not?

I take... as the Americans would say... the 5th amendment.

If you have had a fairly steady diet of romantic era music at the expense of Bach, I can understand the OP's sentiment as the two are as different as night and day. I was of a similar mind set. I never disliked him. But I just couldn't warm up to his works.

However....I suffered an injury about 15 months ago and my teacher switched me to some Bach WTC. Since then I have grown to love Bach so much that I'm not working on much else. Making up for lost time I guess. For some he can be an acquired taste. Nonetheless I challenge anyone who doesn't "get" Bach to attempt one of his P&F or Inventions. Much more difficult than he looks on the printed page.

Thanks chaps for your thoughts on merry Olde Bach ... but what comes through is a distant respect for the ancient geezer, largely because we have difficulty puzzling out his WTC Preludes and Fugues ... and tend therefore to mothball them in the Everest category for later consideration. (much later)

Mustn’t bore the company with an analysis of the Bach keyboard format ... but essentially ... on his pale little clavichord ... JS bashed out a single-note dialogue between left and right hands ... but so often ends up like the echo of a yodelling competition in the Swiss Alps.

Here’s Bach’s Invention No. 1 in C major ... first 2 measures.

Half measure RH "twiddle" in 16ths and repeated a 5th higher in m2 with echoes at half measure an octave lower by the LH ... but so predictable.

But imagine then using the same format for 24 Preludes and Fugues in both major and minor keys for Book I ... and then repeating in Book II.

Anybody for tennis?

Unless I have mistaken your intent, you mean the 1st Amendment.

I'm sorry you see Bach this way. My favorite music invariably comes from the Romantic period, but I hold Bach in great esteem as a compositional genius of nearly unparalleled capacity. The fact alone that his keyboard music transfers so well to the modern piano is a testament to his facility.

It's about realzing the potential of the idea. So the first movement of Beethoven's Fifth also 'yodels'?

Bach's sons relate how, when listening to a fugue, he would tell them what the composer was going to do with the subject on hearing the first entry. He knew what could and could not be done with an idea in an instant.

[quote=argerichfanI was waiting for Deborah to come back at me ...could it be Seattle? That's where Deborah is from. [/quote]

Actually, I'm a born and raised New Yorker but I do find Seattle to be most pleasantly civilized and I intend to plant my roots long and deep here.

Bach rules!

But the same format wasn't used, at least as regards "a single note dialogue between the left and right hands." If that were true, wouldn't all the fugues have only two voices? A quick perusal of the thematic index reveals three-part and four-part (and a few five-part) fugues instead.

I'm more familiar with the partitas than any other genre of Bach's keyboard music, and I think they are a trove of beautiful and diverse music.

Steven

The majesty of Bach is found in his symphonies with the
strings holding the whole Baroque zizzing-thing together ...
his clapped-out clavichord couldn’t match the cat-gut boys.

Multi-voice WTC examples (all those grandiose indications of
3,4 and even 5 voices) need to be seen as dialogues between
two hands ... but with the notes in chord formations.

But chaps ... when did you last do a cartwheel after playing
a Bach Prelude and Fugue? ... or is it a bit like dutifully
taking castor oil in the belief that it does you some good.



Thought I'd throw in a diagram of the Invention 1 opening rash of twiddly bits ... sorry Kingy, but can't buy the rationale
of the bits being anything more cerebral than patterns.